The Effects of NEES the Rat with Induced transient brain injury

This study is aimed at examining the effects of the application of NEES(needle electrode electrical stimulation; EA) at GV20 and LI4 in the early cerebral ischemia the size of cerebral infarction, COX-2 and IL-6. For this experiment, a total of twenty-one, four-week-old male SD(standard deviation) rats weighing 160g to 200g were selected and randomly classified into the GV20 group, LI4 group and ischemia group, with seven in each group. All experiment animals were fixed. As for the GV20 group, the bregma, corresponding to the acupoint GV20 of the ischemia-induced SD rat, was stimulated for thirty minutes with an acupunctural electrode low frequency stimulator(PG6, ITO, JAPAN, 9V, 2Hz). As for LI4 group, the acupoint LI4 was stimulated as above, while for group 3, no stimulation was applied. The results from immuno-histological test indicated that the ischemia group showed the highest COX-2 expression value in the cortex of the cerebrum, according to the size of cerebral infarction; the GV20 group, the next; and the LI group, the last. In addition, the LI4 group showed the lowest COX-2 expression value in putamen. The expression value of IL-6 was, correlated with COX-2 and, the ischemia group showed the highest expression value in the cortex of cerebrum. The LI4 group, with the smallest infarction, showed the lowest expression value in putamen. It can be inferred that NEES, applied at LI4 and GV20 in early ischemia, is effective in delaying the expression of the inflammatory agents, IL-6 and COX-2, resulting from stroke. In addition, LI4 stimulation was more effective than GV20 stimulation. Clinically, NEES is beneficial for controlling early inflammatory reaction in acute ischemic stroke.